


morning glory

by Anonymous



Category: Hunter X Hunter
Genre: Canon Compliant, Drabble, Friends With Benefits, Heaven's Arena Arc (Hunter X Hunter), Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Self-Indulgent, Unresolved Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-23
Updated: 2020-09-23
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:21:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 873
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26611363
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Hisoka and Illumi have an early morning face-painting session.
Relationships: Hisoka/Illumi Zoldyck
Comments: 9
Kudos: 111
Collections: Anonymous Fics





	morning glory

“Like this?” Illumi asks with an inclination of his chin.

“Yes.” Hisoka stands over him. He slips a hand beneath his jawline to hold him still, a brush in the other hand. “Like that.”

The mattress dips, but does not creak, beneath their combined weight. It’s soft. Expensive, like everything else at this level of the Heaven’s Arena. Illumi himself had indulged in this sort of luxury during his stay so many years ago, but he has only recently found himself reacquainted with it. He’s found himself becoming familiar with other things, too. 

The shape of Hisoka, for instance. 

(The slopes and grooves along his waist and down his hips; the feel of his skin beneath Illumi’s hands, where the crescent-shaped imprints of his nails draw blood. He loves that part the most. They both do.)

His scent. 

(He’s uncannily particular about hygiene off of the field, but when Illumi breathes him in, the saccharine fragrance of bubblegum does not hide the sharp undertone of copper. The cloying traces of death that follows them both and no amount of meticulous scrubbing will cleanse them of it. This, Illumi knows best.)

Hisoka himself is still a mystery, even if Illumi knows the ins and outs of his body, but he doesn’t think too hard on it. They’re business associates and _this_ , too, is an arrangement. It’s the rationality behind give-and-take that keeps the bloodlust in check for Illumi and leaves him wondering how long it will satiate Hisoka before he, too, is consumed, by the magician’s bottomless desire. Sometimes he even catches glimpses of the stirring beast, a growing bloodlust that yearns for bigger and greater things with each wave. 

He’s in a sloppily vulnerable position, Illumi realizes when the back of Hisoka’s knuckles brush over his pulse. Ink-black eyes remain wide and unblinking as the tension in Hisoka’s fingers lets up, eventually. The first brushstroke is wet and cold, a slanted yellow line across Illumi’s cheek. He scrunches his nose, and Hisoka talks to Illumi with a strange amusement when he says, “Hold still, or it won’t turn out well.”

“You do this every morning?” 

“Mhm,” Hisoka nods with a little smile. It’d seem less malicious if the point of his nail weren’t digging into the underside of Illumi's chin. The only thing that keeps him in place is a vague sense of trust, the understanding that if Hisoka had intended on killing him _today_ , one of them would have been dead on the floor long ago. “You’d know this, if you ever stayed.”

The fourth side of the star is a little off. Illumi feels the brush double back on that line. “I have better things to do.”

“Nothing today?” 

“I have another job today, near your place. It would be pointless to go back to the mansion, just to come back.” 

“You’ve been taking a lot of jobs here,” Hisoka says with little grace or subtlety, an implication to it that neither of them acknowledges. There’s a smirk on his pale face that Illumi doesn’t like the look of. He leans back and dips the brush back into the paint, and he’s oddly quiet as he takes Illumi’s face back into his hand, and starts to fill in the star.

“It’s convenient, having them all in the same area.” 

“Convenient,” his partner—associate—echoes with amusement, and he rinses off the paint on the brush hairs in a small container of water. It dips into the pink paint, now, as he adds lightheartedly, “I’m sure _this_ is convenient, too.”

The purr of Hisoka’s voice becomes heavier at the emphasis. 

_This_ , he’d said. Vaguely, like a whispered secret to be kept. In spite of whatever pretense of friendliness they keep, although those golden eyes gaze at him like he’s something prized, it is the way in which one would behold a trophy hunted for sport. There is nothing more to its depths, as far as he can see.

“It is,” Illumi agrees, at length, as Hisoka traces a droplet beneath his left eye, eliciting a low noise that almost sounds disappointed.

This, too, will be temporary just as it is convenient, not unlike their overall correspondence. After all, there is an end to every trade. Every exchange. Every service. An odd sensation possesses him at the thought. 

“How cold of you,” Hisoka grins, showing teeth. He's hardly one to talk, using others at his leisure whenever it suits him, but Illumi figures that's just another tendency they share. One more dip into the paint and the teardrop fills itself with an efficiency, with less feeling. Hisoka leans away, propping the brush onto the dish as his hand falls to his side.

“How do I look?” 

The smile on Hisoka's face turns lopsided, a puff of a laugh escaping his lips, “Do you really want to know?” 

“Yes.” 

“You look wonderful, Illumi. Always do.” He reaches out, something darker to his eyes now, but Illumi remains unflinching as Hisoka traces a thumb over his jawline. From Hisoka’s open hand, a cluster of needles scatters over the assassin’s lap.

Illumi stares back at him with something just short of surprise in his expression. 

“You didn’t need these for me to tell you that, though.”

**Author's Note:**

> oops haha this is anonymous sorry
> 
> just a hisoillu drabble for now because i physically cannot contain the brainworms. i've got a lot of drabble ideas, so this may turn into a series.


End file.
